MSOCS - Interesting. The engine war covered a couple of PMs and I never heard of any resistance there.
The primary reason for the scrapping of the F136 was to offset the out-of-control overruns in the air vehicle and F135. However, the first attempts were reversed by Congress.
P&W then weighed in with a staggeringly mendacious lobbying campaign, repeatedly claiming that they had been selected competitively and that GE had lobbied its way on to the program. JSFPO could have at least disputed that, but they did not.
Most of the media was also AWOL, covering the dispute as "he said, she said, so the truth must be somewhere in between." Trouble is, that approach favors the side that tells the bigger porkies.