Because the Stryker platform does it cheaper, more capably, more sustainably, and to greater combat effectiveness -- to the point it was one of the contributing factors to the FCS program's demise (the others being recent production blocks of the Abrams and Bradley AFV's which did the job better with existing hardware)?
Right. Well, we'll get there.
Yes, advanced optics systems worked...and the whole-ass lunch was eaten by the Nett warrior program. Because again, why spend hundreds of billions of dollars in R&D over the span of decades, when one can simply develop proprietary operating systems and software for commercially-available smartphones and smartwatches.
Same deal for the stupid fucking power armor. Why spend hundreds of billions of dollars in R&D over the span of decades, when in the meantime MIT is over here saying "hey, we have working prototypes for liquid armor that are more effective without sacrificing warfighter mobility or fatigue, without the additional logistic burden of powering and maintaining powered armor"?
I get it, you love the ridiculously expensive overengineered boondoggles because they get headlines in Popular Mechanics or what-the-fuck-ever, and they look really cool. But you need to understand those boondoggles exist because colonels and generals really, really want high-paying jobs in the private sector, and are willing to suck the government teat dry for one. The rest of us are interested in whether or not whatever shit the Pentagon squats out over the armed forces is actually going to help win wars.
Again, we'll get to this.
Such a threat that its entire regional empire aspirations can be brought to heel by...a tariff. A country near-exclusively dependent on the US market (for now) to sustain its own existence, ain't a threat.
Which is incredibly ironic, that for all US chickenhawkishness in the face of China, the end result is driving it to securing and strengthening economic relations to Russia, various African countries, Saudi Arabia, and even fucking India. Nobody gives the remotest fuck about that stupid little island, but for hegemonic dick-waving and sabre-rattling brought about because a dead president was happier with a fascist sucking his dick than a communist.
Now it's time for us to loop back to the beginning of your post, the Armata platform. You do know Russia killed that six months ago, right? you know why they killed it? too expensive as compared to updating the T-90, in terms of manufacturing and support. But realistically it was more likely than not another lemon that didn't deliver the goods, like most Russian AFV experiments.
It's funny how Russia said they've deployed the T-14 to Ukraine and to great effect, but no actual recorded results or data points on that from either side of the conflict. About the same as the Su-57's combat performance thus far in Ukraine...which is, if I recall correctly, getting shot down in short order. By makeshift drones. But of course, Russia says they haven't used them in Ukraine so far, but at the same time they've been used in Ukraine to attack over 40 targets, just trust them bro.
See, here's the thing about Russia and China: they lie their asses off about the capabilities of their materiel. Then hawks repeat those lies to say we need bigger, better, faster and more expensive materiel, because we have to close defensive "gaps". It's a tale as old as the "missile gap" and it hasn't been true since the Soviet Union put the IS-8 to bed. Then does the US acquire that materiel through defection, theft, or acquisition of wreckage, or it shows up on a battlefield baring its whole ass to the world, and that they've just been building giant pieces of shit can no longer be hidden from the world at large.
You should know how this plays out from the story of Victor Belenko's defection alone. You know, the time when the entire Pentagon was performatively shitting its pants over the MiG-25 to maintain the kayfabe it was some Rooskie Super Anime Fighter against which we needed Newer, Bigger, Better, Faster fighters RFN. Despite the intelligence agencies telling the DoD it wasn't shit and we had nothing to worry about. Then bro just outright defected with one along with a whole lot of leaked information about the MiG-31, we disassembled and investigated it, and could no longer hide the fact it (and the MiG-31) wasn't shit and we had nothing to worry about.
The irony you're telling me to stop listening to Russian and Chinese propaganda when you're uncritically repeating this nonsense, all evidence to the contrary, is palpable.
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