$22 billion buys... what, exactly?

DefenseTech has an article about exactly what all that FCS investment bought, and how half of it doesn't work worth a crap.

So what has that $22.6 billion in FCS development money bought? Here’s where it gets real ugly. GAO just came out with its annual assessment of major weapons systems (.pdf) and they looked at the first increment of those spin outs which includes unattended munitions, including the Non-Line-Of-Sight Launch System (NLOS-LS), sensors, a small hovering drone, a small robot, new radios and software.
The small iRobot-type robot, hundreds of which have been in use in Iraq and Afghanistan, “could not provide infrared imagery necessary to recognize a person at required distances,” GAO said. The hovering “beer keg” is far too noisy, and could only operate for 4 hours before failure, instead of the required 23. The unattended ground sensor was supposed to operate for 127 hours, it only works for 5 hours. Army officials say the images it produces are terrible.
The NLOS-LS, as we’ve written about here, failed in recent tests to hit its intended target in four out of six tries. Army Maj. Gen. Keith Walker, the service’s Future Force Integration Directorate Commander, told us last month he suspects the missiles issues are serious. Remember, most of this stuff has been in development since 2003.
At least the current Army program people are forthcoming. I covered FCS circa 2005–2007 and it was really frustrating to have Boeing and Army people go on-and-on telling you to your face how well the program was performing.

By: Brant