A lot of this adversarial nature comes down to how projects are awarded. Government employees have very little discretion to choose projects, so they always go with the cheapest bid. But no large software project ever has had 0 change orders.
So the only profitable way to win these contracts is offer the cheapest bid by delivering as little as possible while being in spec, and then pillaging on the change orders.
What about the "new defense" companies, who use VC money to build demos? Surely they eventually want to build moats and sell razor blades, but for now what they're doing seems different?
So the only profitable way to win these contracts is offer the cheapest bid by delivering as little as possible while being in spec, and then pillaging on the change orders.