"Bloody Nonsense!"

This is the statement from the builders of Britain's new aircraft carriers, BAE Systems. Cost estimates, as on so many of America's high tech weaponry, seem to be greatly exaggerated, from the present $5.24 billion (US), to a more probable $6.32 billion.

Mike Turner, the chief executive of BAE Systems, Britain's largest defence contractor, has savaged what he sees as premature announcements by the Government of the price of huge military contracts.
Turner told The Sunday Telegraph: "This country has all too often in the past shot itself in the foot by standing up in Parliament before any work has been done at all, any money spent, saying it's going to cost £2.9bn and be in service in 2012. Bloody nonsense! Nobody knows!"

Soundsvaguelyy like American cost estimates for its own futurecarrierr CVN-21, with total price ranging from $6 to $11 billion.