Why The World’s Armies Don’t Want U.S. Tech Anymore -- Bill Sweetman, Daily Beast
America used to be the global leader in war gear. But now, many of our weapons are second rate.
Boeing briefed reporters on the Army-led Joint Multi Role rotorcraft project—intended as a high-tech replacement for most of the thousands of helicopters in the Pentagon’s fleets—in Mesa, Arizona, late last month.
“We’ve shot ourselves in the foot twice,” I said, “and we are all out of feet.” My comment was not exactly diplomatic, but the JMR vision of a one-size-fits-all, fast and efficient rotorcraft technology platform that would leave the rest of the world in the dust gave me double flashbacks: to the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor and the LHX/Comanche, which had similar goals and fell far short of them. (Although the V-22 was not cancelled outright, as the Army killed Comanche in 2004, the objective was something that cost little more than a helicopter, without the Osprey’s fighter-like price tag.)
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My Comment: I cannot argue with much of this report. The U.S. was a leader for a long time .... but hubris, politics, little if any competition among U.S. defense industrial giants .... the world has caught up and is now surpassing what the U.S. can develop and manufacture .... and in some cases they can surpass it.
Update: It should also be noted that industrial espionage and spying has hurt the U.S. defense industry. The U.S. spends the tens of billions of dollars on necessary R&D .... and other nations steal/take the best of what is discovered to help their own industries.
1 comment:
I think politicians harping about the cost of a weapon starts a death spiral.
Yes, you have always got to watch the bottom line, financial health. but the opposition by some in congress is idealogical.
The complain about the cost per unit. So they use their political muscle to cut the number of units, which of course raises the cost per unit. This give them more fodder to demagogue and they are off to the races.
You cut the the units purchase of course you are going to spread the set up cost over fewer units.
They would be better off looking into the procurement processes, auditing the books and learning some science and engineering. But 60% of the congress are lawyers.
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