Since there is military competition between countries, it’s more like, if we choose A and China chooses B, are we still at an advantage or will China overwhelm our superior trained manned fighters with lots of cheap drones?

I get the line of thought and the idea of inflated military budgets but I'm not sure your average Joe should get any say in whether a new weapons system should be funded or not. They have no military expertise and no concept of what might be necessary to win the next war. While I do think there needs to be more oversight over how budgets are allotted to military projects, it shouldn't be decided by "do taxpayers want to pay".