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The F-35 suffered from each branch wanting the plane to be something different. The same airframe has to support radically different internals and flight characteristics on the A, B, and C models. The program had a myriad of issues but if each branch had just developed its own the cost would have been overall lower.

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Sometimes, in government procurement especially, you have to realise that the 'program' and 'the outcome' are two distinct entities. F35 was a high profile, congress level program that everyone knew was a priority. If i was some Air Force general that has been thinking about halolenses, Advanced AI, manuverability, radar, cloaking, etc. You could get funding through the project. So many different things came out of the f35 outside of the f35.

It also had to be built with tech the US was willing to export to foreign "partners" (and whatever allegiances they might harbor).

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