U.S. Navy/Getty Images In this image released by the U.S. Navy
courtesy of Lockheed Martin, the U.S. Navy variant of the F-35
Joint Strike Fighter, the F-35C, conducts a test flight February
11, 2011 over the Chesapeake Bay. Lt. Cmdr. As the country edges
closer to the fiscal cliff, the pentagon is facing some
particularly deep cuts. But there's one program that not only
seems invulnerable to cuts; Its costs actually keep ballooning.
We're talking about America's newest jet fighter, the F-35 Joint
Strike Fighter. Here in California, building the plane involves
300 manufacturers and tens of thousands of jobs. To build and
maintain the aircraft, the government estimates it will have to
spend over $1 trillion, making it the most expensive weapons
program ever. To put it in perspective, $1 trillion dollars is
roughly the size of the Australian gross domestic product.
Winslow Wheeler, director at the Project on Government Oversight
in Washington DC, is here to explain.