A Case Study On Why It Is Hard To Kill Billion-Dollar Pentagon Programs

The V-22 Osprey, a $70 million craft made by Bell Helicopter Textron and Boeing, takes off like a helicopter and flies like a plane. Pool photo by Susan Walsh

Costly Aircraft Suggests Cuts Won’t Be Easy -- New York Times

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta shoved his head into a snug aviator helmet topped with goggles one September morning and swooped into Lower Manhattan on a V-22 Osprey, a $70 million aircraft that Marines use for battlefield assaults in Afghanistan.

“How’d you like that gizmo?” Mr. Panetta said after landing at the Wall Street heliport in the Osprey, which takes off like a helicopter, flies like an airplane — and has been responsible for the deaths of 30 people in test flights.

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My Comment: A sobering analysis on why it is difficult to cut programs from the defense budget.