The Government does a lot of comparison testing between commercial products. The test reports are always have a limited distribution, the typical distribution is Distribution B, which is a Distribution authorized to U.S. Government agencies only.
Even though the Government is funded by public taxpayer money, it is very sensitive to the damage that might be caused to business by the release of unfavorable information. Therefore, given that commercial products were tested, and compared, there are going to be “winners” and “losers”. If the list of “losers” and the problems that the “loser” products experienced were released to the public, this information would cause substantial economic harm to the “losers”. And, considering that the “loser’s” product could have been improved later, based on the test, given the irrational and hysterical nature of the public, perhaps it is to the best that this information is kept out of the public domain.
The DoD figured out long ago, basically in the 50’s, that the shooting public was not its friend. You can go through the vintage Gun’s Magazines on the web
http://gunsmagazine.com/classic-guns-magazine-editions/ , which I have, and find hostile articles dealing with the introduction of the M14. I recall reading one, the author found out that some part, maybe the bolt, was in short supply, was gating delivery of the rifle. The whole article castigated the Army for incompetence, offered the “expert” author’s opinion that production of the M14 should stop immediately and (I think) conversion of Garands should start, as from the author’s opinion, the M14 was a mistake and of course, the shortage of this part could never be remedied. What is likely, by the time this idiot Gun writer’s article was in print, the bolt shortage at the manufacturer’s was over. For me, reading this stuff only confirmed the lack of gravitas in the utterances of gunwriters, and the small mindedness of gunwriters is something that can be validated no matter what century the article was written.
Anyway, there are some that can remember that the first Beretta 92 pistols had a slide breakage issue, this got out into the public and has been used for decades to defame what is, a very good pistol. So, keeping product failure information out of the hands of the public is without a doubt, a good thing.