I think there's a reasonable argument for autonomy's relevance to the war in Ukraine. Jamming and other electronic warfare measures have decreased the efficacy of the traditional weapons you cite. There's a credible (beyond my [ability] to evaluate if true) argument that autonomy can overcome the ability to cut off communication with the UAVs and thus would make a big difference. Autonomy of course has a range of downsides and risks, but I do think it's relevant.
If there are open interfaces at critical junctures, it's a lot easier to allow for more competitors and the role of major primes focuses more on [system] integration and not vertical integration. But that requires government buying key portions of IP owning the tech baseline. It's a technologically complex challenge and a collective action problem, but it seems relevant to your critiques of the system.
[P.S. I'm always glad to see deeper engagement on acquisition issues from the progressive side, thanks for these pieces.]
Thanks for your comments. I enjoyed the CSIS report. I agree with some of your points here--particularly on Ukraine. MOSA is a good, but not ideal, way to eliminate waste and redundancy while creating competition (marginalizing the overall influence of the Big Five is key), but I still think greater regulation is needed along the lines we described. Congressional intervention to regulate the acquisitions process is needed, but it must go beyond acquisitions, in my view. But thanks again for these thoughts.
Restoring the Office of Technology Assessment is certainly all to the good. I'm also a believe in the maxim of "don't contract out your brains."
That said, I think that prior decades did just have an easier defense acquisition environment because DoD spending was a larger portion of the tech sector, domestic and global R&D. There are certainly trade offs to be made between exquisite systems and mass, but like Bill LaPlante I think those will often be tough trade offs rather than having a clear answer that would help us return to 50 primes and systematically less complex and lower unit cost systems. I think the WSARA reforms had some real merit and the B21 is a vindication of that model. But with a smaller relative defense sector a mostly stick and few carrot approach risks just leading companies to take their business elsewhere. More progressive income tax might help that sort of thing, but I do think that trying to solve economy-wide problems within the acquisition sphere can lead to a reduction in government capacity.
That said, could be wrong and always looking to test those hypotheses. I do want to get back to some past HHI metric consolidation research and really dig into what happened in the 1990s.
Regardless, I'll check out your book when it comes out. I am a MOSA believer in good part because I understand the trade offs and the risks and it's an approach that's been put into practice fairly effectively in a variety of contexts. When it comes to transportation infrastructure acquisition reform, I'm deeply dismayed with the Anglo-sphere results and hopeful for the example set by Spain and Northeast Asian democracies. I hope you'll have some positive examples to chew on in the often dismal field of defense acquisition.
There's nothing wrong with non-monopolistic capitalism, but it is an enormous error to think that capitalism can deliver towards national or public interest.
Let's start with utilities: we don't allow outright capitalism in water, sewage, garbage, electricity and telephone utility services because these are all inherently monopoly-genic, but also because having cheap and reliable utility services is far more important than any possible "efficiency" introduced by capitalist competition.
2) An enormous ecosystem of hardware manufacturers that were able to reorient their production towards airplanes
Today we have neither.
Silicon Valley "smart" hardware and software is not going to do jack diddly if the ante of artillery shells, missiles, artillery barrels and what not cannot be met. We are witnessing a real world iteration of Arthur C. Clarke's Superiority short story: https://avalonlibrary.net/ebooks/Arthur%20C%20Clarke%20-%20Superiority.pdf
"What we want are new weapons-weapons totally different from any that have been employed before. Such weapons can be made: it will take time, of course, but since assuming charge I have replaced some of the older scientists by young men and havedirected, research into several unexplored fields which show great promise. I believe, in fact, that a revolution in warfare may soon be upon us."
I think there's a reasonable argument for autonomy's relevance to the war in Ukraine. Jamming and other electronic warfare measures have decreased the efficacy of the traditional weapons you cite. There's a credible (beyond my [ability] to evaluate if true) argument that autonomy can overcome the ability to cut off communication with the UAVs and thus would make a big difference. Autonomy of course has a range of downsides and risks, but I do think it's relevant.
I forget if i've pitched this to you before, but I do think that modular open systems are an important concept for addressing some of your concerns: https://www.csis.org/analysis/readiness-open-systems-how-prepared-are-pentagon-and-defense-industry-coordinate
If there are open interfaces at critical junctures, it's a lot easier to allow for more competitors and the role of major primes focuses more on [system] integration and not vertical integration. But that requires government buying key portions of IP owning the tech baseline. It's a technologically complex challenge and a collective action problem, but it seems relevant to your critiques of the system.
[P.S. I'm always glad to see deeper engagement on acquisition issues from the progressive side, thanks for these pieces.]
Thanks for your comments. I enjoyed the CSIS report. I agree with some of your points here--particularly on Ukraine. MOSA is a good, but not ideal, way to eliminate waste and redundancy while creating competition (marginalizing the overall influence of the Big Five is key), but I still think greater regulation is needed along the lines we described. Congressional intervention to regulate the acquisitions process is needed, but it must go beyond acquisitions, in my view. But thanks again for these thoughts.
Restoring the Office of Technology Assessment is certainly all to the good. I'm also a believe in the maxim of "don't contract out your brains."
That said, I think that prior decades did just have an easier defense acquisition environment because DoD spending was a larger portion of the tech sector, domestic and global R&D. There are certainly trade offs to be made between exquisite systems and mass, but like Bill LaPlante I think those will often be tough trade offs rather than having a clear answer that would help us return to 50 primes and systematically less complex and lower unit cost systems. I think the WSARA reforms had some real merit and the B21 is a vindication of that model. But with a smaller relative defense sector a mostly stick and few carrot approach risks just leading companies to take their business elsewhere. More progressive income tax might help that sort of thing, but I do think that trying to solve economy-wide problems within the acquisition sphere can lead to a reduction in government capacity.
That said, could be wrong and always looking to test those hypotheses. I do want to get back to some past HHI metric consolidation research and really dig into what happened in the 1990s.
Regardless, I'll check out your book when it comes out. I am a MOSA believer in good part because I understand the trade offs and the risks and it's an approach that's been put into practice fairly effectively in a variety of contexts. When it comes to transportation infrastructure acquisition reform, I'm deeply dismayed with the Anglo-sphere results and hopeful for the example set by Spain and Northeast Asian democracies. I hope you'll have some positive examples to chew on in the often dismal field of defense acquisition.
Intriguing line of thought
There's nothing wrong with non-monopolistic capitalism, but it is an enormous error to think that capitalism can deliver towards national or public interest.
Let's start with utilities: we don't allow outright capitalism in water, sewage, garbage, electricity and telephone utility services because these are all inherently monopoly-genic, but also because having cheap and reliable utility services is far more important than any possible "efficiency" introduced by capitalist competition.
Why then should defense be any different?
Construction Physics posted a great writeup of how the US built an enormous number of airplanes in WW2: https://www.construction-physics.com/p/how-to-build-300000-airplanes-in
Note several key points as to how this happened:
1) Cost plus pricing
2) An enormous ecosystem of hardware manufacturers that were able to reorient their production towards airplanes
Today we have neither.
Silicon Valley "smart" hardware and software is not going to do jack diddly if the ante of artillery shells, missiles, artillery barrels and what not cannot be met. We are witnessing a real world iteration of Arthur C. Clarke's Superiority short story: https://avalonlibrary.net/ebooks/Arthur%20C%20Clarke%20-%20Superiority.pdf
"What we want are new weapons-weapons totally different from any that have been employed before. Such weapons can be made: it will take time, of course, but since assuming charge I have replaced some of the older scientists by young men and havedirected, research into several unexplored fields which show great promise. I believe, in fact, that a revolution in warfare may soon be upon us."
Yep. We can justify anything if it makes a ton of cash.