Remember when War Profiteering was a bad thing?
Or better yet, why not just use the money to buy 36 actual MRAP’s send 25 over to Afghanistan and Iraq and keep 11 for actual training?
such a silly idea...that would make too much sense....
hey i have some 600.00 hammers and a used 5000.00 toilet seat...anyone interested....
The comparison of the cost is not fair, either. What do the training missions entail? Many of the training exercises cover attack scenarios I bet. They probably would involve damaging or destroying a real unit and putting those being trained at risk of injury.
Radon makes very good simulators, and their prices have been generally less than their major competitors. I suspect that the government got a pretty good price. The problem is that Radon would have had to bid a simulator that met all of the government requirements and specifications. The tendency of the last 15 years and so has been to add lots of bells and whistles that drive up costs without improving the training quality. The government always chooses the simulator that looks neat and has the fanciest displays and now writes the requirement that way.
These simulators provide IED blast effects, and handling challenges to include rollovers that are not a good idea to do with the real vehicle, but I’m sure that a cheaper simulator could be built that meets all the training requirements - the government would never buy it.
Because that would make too much sense - and wouldn't grease the pockets of someone's buddy or political ally...