Hacker News Reader

Comment by samcheng | Hacker News Reader

The criticism in the article seems misplaced to me - it falls victim to the sunk cost fallacy.

These ships were problematic from the beginning. I remember them being commissioned without a working gun, alongside reports of ship-wide computer failures leaving the ships dead in the water. If they are costly to operate and ineffective in service, it doesn't really matter how much they cost to build in the first place.

That said, it's really a symptom of American corruption / decline / corporate capture in my mind. This program alone funneled billions of dollars into defense contractors like Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics, with very little incentive for efficiency. What a waste of American wealth!

View on HN

There are many angles.

Two important ones are that the defense contractors are jobs programs, giving good salaries to skilled workers and investing in education distributed across the country. They are also defense preparedness programs: we buy and build constantly whether or not we need things right now because when we do need them, we don't want to build knowhow and whole industries from scratch.

Claiming that it is all being done well is of course absurd, but it is also very hard to build programs that last for decades and through many administrations, many political changes, involving millions of people. And folks are always eager to point out "failures" that aren't always a sign of anything being done wrong, especially from people who have little idea what it's like building an enormous ship/plane/weapon meant to be serviceable for half a century.

No, the real name for this is corruption. There are several ways for the government to create jobs without relying on the war industry. And this without talking about the forever war mongering caused by this war industry lobby, that has costed millions of innocent lives around the world.

People won't vote for Green New Deal. They'll vote for Military. Democracy in action.

> I remember them being commissioned without a working gun

I think you're confusing the LCS with the Zumwalt class... both of which were troubled and mostly cancelled, but for slightly different reasons.

You're right - I was definitely thinking about the Zumwalt's cannon!

Up until the last sentence you had me. Thanks for the laugh CCP.

Um, no. Patriotism doesn't equal support for wasteful government programs, and criticism of one's government doesn't equal support for another country's government.

Understanding that is part of the cultural 'high ground' that the US maintains over China!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com