Did we get an undercover price increase on the F-35?

via FedBiz.

Lockheed Martin Corp. landed another $852.3 million for the F-35 program by way of a contract modification for special tooling and test equipment that will support aircraft purchases from the Navy, Air Force and international partners.
The award will assist Lockheed in upcoming production of the next lot of F-35 Lightning II aircraft. The Department of Defense reportedly signed an agreement in principle earlier this month for initial production of lots 6 and 7, which includes 71 aircraft.
The special tooling and test equipment purchases will support production of the first 36 U.S. and partner nation aircraft in lot 6, which kick off by mid-2014. The modification is "critical to preserving the current F-35 delivery schedules and meeting future production rates," according to the DOD announcement.

I read this today and my jaw hit the floor.

Just last week we heard about some of the draconian cuts that were coming our way if sequestration continued.  I've read articles from "think tanks" saying that personnel exemptions being put on the Pentagon by the White House was the BIGGEST defense related failure of this administration.

We heard from the President saying that unless the Congress acted to kill sequestration that Veterans Benefits and Retirees Tricare could be affected.

Now I read that Lockheed Martin is suddenly getting another 850 plus million dollars for tooling and test equipment for lot 6 production?

I'm used to the Pentagon playing games.  The fact that portions of Lockheed Martin engages in a bit of skullduggery isn't shocking (it hasn't reached missiles or ground vehicles yet...hopefully those guys can hold the line).  But this roll out of contracts all to cover the production of the same number of aircraft is odd.

And on the surface it looks like a lie.

If you include these costs with the price of the airplanes that were announced, then any cost reduction just evaporated.  I don't have the numbers to crunch but it seems like if everything is factored we got an undercover price increase on the latest batch of planes.

I'll wait patiently to hear the latest reasons why I'm so off base with this line of thinking but something smells to high heaven on this.