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From ARRSEpedia

The British Military has a habit of procuring and adopting, usually at great expense to the taxpayer, many things that either:

• Aren't needed
• Don't work
• Are obsolete before they're introduced (or even designed in some cases)
• Are crap
• Work eventually but cost the GDP of a mid-sized African country to fix
• Are not squaddy proof
• Are more expensive and worse than civilian equivalents that can be bought off-the-shelf

We're not alone in this; but at least American Military procurement mysteries don't completely stuff the Defence budget for everything else. Examples include:

• SA-80
• Nimrod AWACS - so embarrassingly crap that it is featured as a case study in MK2
• BOWMAN
• Eurofighter Typhoon
• Enfield No.2 Revolver
• Combat 95
• Chaingun
• Clansman - although to be fair, when is was introduced in the early 80s was pretty good. The problem is that it is still in service some 25 years later.
• SA-80 bayonet
• Boots, Cardboard (several patterns)
• Straps, utility
• .303" ammunition
• Future Lynx
• L81A2 Cadet Target Rifle

Near-misses that were almost foisted on the army include:

• Pattern 13 Rifle
• EM-2 Rifle (was supposed to work OK but it's still a bullpup)
• Burton magazine (ok, so this was a very long time ago)
• .402 Enfield-Martini ammunition

See also: Procurement decisions