New figures released by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) show that Gordon Brown's personal decision as chancellor in 1998 to lease the four Boeing C17 Globemasters instead of buying outright was the more expensive option.
Buying the huge transporters outright would have cost £520 million, but instead the MoD paid £769 million to lease the aircraft for eight years and an extra £220 million to buy them afterwards, a total of £989 million.
The MoD said the decision to lease the aircraft instead of buy them was taken to meet short-term operational requirements.
Is that the same thing as not thinking ahead? And would £500 mill have helped with this?