[Spruce]

...o make more, they'd have to rebuild factories or find other factories; make the tools all over again...

I read this often about many various systems.

Why do we do this? Destroy the tooling, teams, and capability to produce hardware. I mean, doesn't this infrastructure cost the largest portion of the development budget?

It just doesn't make sense.

[A.A. Cunningham]

Politicians, who make these decisions, aren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer; re: Cheney and the F-14D.

[ClaireSolt]

Whiteman AFB is probably in Ike Skelton’s district. Defense contracting is a lucrative type of pork. When power shifts on the committees, someone else gets the pork. btw, I spent most of my life within a hundred miles of Whiteman and never even saw a tornado. Tornados are very destructive and also rare.

[Mr. Jeeves]

Why do we do this? Destroy the tooling, teams, and capability to produce hardware.

Probably out of concern that foreign agents will steal parts or plans - which is not out of the question. But if you can defend the gold in Fort Knox...