Fred Kaplan, the only human being in the country who actually reads military budgets, explains why Paul Ryan doesn't understand military budgets. I admit I don't either except that I suspect there's truth in this formula I was told years ago…
That one-third of every U.S. military budget is for necessary expenditures to deal with any possible security need;
That one-third goes to stuff that doesn't or will never work or be needed;
And that one-third goes for toys that our leaders think would be cool to have in a Top Gun sense and which we also will never need or use.
I also remember an anecdote Tip O'Neill used to tell. Some defense-oriented Congressman with much clout in this area wanted to order dozens of a new fighter plane that some company proposed making. Let's call it the Q-1. O'Neill amassed some pretty firm data that showed the Q-1 was a lemon that would consume billions and would never fly. He presented it to the Congressman and suggested, "Instead of wasting all that money on that piece of junk, let's put it into the V-2, which is a superior plane in every way."
The Congressman's response? "We have to have both of them!" (He later accused O'Neill of being "soft on defense" for not wanting to order the Q-1.)