Yes, I have a friend who left plasma physics and is still salty about the situation with ITER. She also said that by the time they're done, the technology is going to be outdated since it all began in the 80's.

I'd disagree that they are there to pump money into administrators. Some of these problems are just really hard and requires monstrously large organizations to make headway. At worst, I'd say that they are misguided/focusing on the wrong scientific questions or in the case of ITER stuck on a path that should have been abandoned a while ago.