F-22′s Catch-22: Money For Nuttin’, Checks for Free

By Mark Thompson | @MarkThompson_DC | August 8, 2011 | +

An F-22 actually flying in March

An F-22 Raptor performs a demonstration for the Luke AFB community during Luke Days 2011 Open House at Luke Air Force Base, Ariz., March 19, 2011. (U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Tracie Forte)

Didn’t mean to make my first day back to Battleland such a downer, but this piece from the Los Angeles Times over the weekend on the Air Force’s F-22 fleet can’t pass by unnoted:

It’s the most expensive fighter jet ever built. Yet the F-22 Raptor has never seen a day of combat, and its future is clouded by a government safety investigation that has grounded the jet for months…At an estimated cost of $412 million each, the F-22s amount to about $65 billion sitting on the tarmac…Now, while other U.S. warplanes pummel targets, the F-22 has sat silently throughout battles in Afghanistan. It has gone unused in Iraq. There has been no call for it in the conflict above Libya.

Your tax dollars at parade rest. Dire straits, indeed.

Related Topics: Air Force, Military, National Security, Pentagon, Weapons

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