Well I seem to have winkled out some of the reasons for this disaster. And I am happy to be corrected by those who were nearer the problems than I ever was. I was merely recounting my experience with the PE.
The day after the ITDU trial of 'Kite' (our code for the SA80 sight) we were descended upon by some chaps from the MoD who wanted us to hand over the two prototypes. These were 'knife and fork' hand built jobs, and as the project was PV, we naturally demurred. We did give them the specification data, and a few weeks later an urgent OR came authorising us to proceed with the development of an infantry weapon sight for the SA80! OK this was 'their Gunships', not 'their Airships', but the effect would have been the same.
I had plenty of dealings with the RAF on LRMTS on the Tornado and I found the technical ability of many of their officers a bit lacking. No fault of the officers concerned, the troubles were much higher up. As someone says above, a pilot is not automatically an engineer, though this engineer is a pilot (glider).