I'm refraining from making too much comments, I'm drafting several points coupled with my own experiences working in governmental engagements.
- when stakeholders say everything is ok, it usually is not.
- when stakeholders saw things crumbling down, they wanted to get things back on track within one week (sigh....). It took 5 months. With the team working 24/7 or something, having synergies in place and pumping adrenaline within the team.
- having a cache added to drop response time from 8 to 2 seconds looks familiar. This point alone really shows lack of architectural decisions in the first place.
I'm missing some other technical details for adding more comments, but nevertheless that was a nice read. The only conclusion you can take is that in any project, it's not the technology that matters, but people making it work.
Oh and yes, the industry should add another role in projects: troubleshooter.