Engines,
What you point out in Kendall's "fads" in acquisition is more or less what Dwight Eisenhower warned in his nationally televised speech in 1961. Part of what he said was this:
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
The F-35 program is getting the public attention it requires, being the single largest DoD acquisition program. Besides that, the cost of the program is way over budget, the resulting aircraft is less capable than what Lockheed-Martin advertised and promised the DoD to win the contract and is years late in actual production and deployment.
The F-35 program is symptomatic of larger DoD acquisition problems, an aircraft carrier that was to cost $8-9 Billion is now going to cost ~$16 Billion and is running 4 years late, the DDG-1000 ship which has been basically deemed a failure as it now stands and various required advance electronic defensive systems that have not been developed on time or fail to work as promised. The United States spends more on defense programs alone than the combination of the next dozen highest defense spending countries in the world. How much of this spending is the result of incompetence, promises not kept and continued "fix it" programs lumped often with follow on "upgrades"?
You bet I object to the F-35 program and not because we don't need a capable aircraft as it once was advertised to be, I object because of the complacency that now exists in the military-industrial complex that has run amok abetted by the United States Congress who holds no one responsible except the taxpayers that are footing the bill.
TD