You know those movies in which the villain at some point shouts, “I’m going to rule the world?” He never adds, even under his breath, “if I can get this damn tank started,” or “providing this fershlugginer gun will shoot for a change.” But for anyone setting out to take over the real world today, such qualifications — and many many more — are embarrassingly necessary.

The relentless enrichment of the “defense” industries at the expense of everybody else continues apace in all those countries run by people who want to take over the world — on other words, countries that are run by the defense industries. Expense is no object, it seems, when you’re after the biggest bomb, fastest fighter, or most menacing ship. The results are increasingly hilarious:

This high-priced crapification of high tech war machines is not confined to the United States:

China had been scheduled to unveil its new home-grown engine for its new-generation stealth fighter, the J-29, ay the Zhuhai Air Show this week. But the engine failed its reliability tests , and China, which some believe wants to rule the world, will have to continue to depend on Russia, which has shown signs of wanting to rule the world, to build the engines for the J-20.

Russia, which under Vladimir Putin acts as if it were still the Soviet Union and a global superpower, has been trying to replace Soviet-era ships, tanks and aircraft with new generation stuff but has not had the money to keep up. Russia actually has an economy the size of Italy’s — it is dwarfed by those of California and Texas (not combined, individually).

As a result of all this crapification, these are lean times for all the World War Three fans, who are chafing at having to make do with sputtering riots in Afghanistan and the like instead of the carpet bombing and tank battles they crave. But when it comes to ruling the world, it’s turning out that no one can afford it and no one can start the engines.