How Quickly Can the DoD Rebuild and Recast the Munitions Industrial Base?

Aeolun

Surely, knowing what the requirements are, we can build a cheaper Tomahawk missile these days, right? SpaceX does the whole rocket launch thing for a fraction of the cost of the space shuttle. GPS is not that complicated any more and all the processing power required fits in a chip the size of a cellphone. But those things cost 2.5M a piece?

doctorpangloss

i don't know. the DoD is planning for the wrong wars. the bloodiest war in the US was the civil war.

robertclaus

Reading up on some of these systems is wild. For example THAAD munitions are wildly expensive, but also a ballistic projectile that physically knocks hypersonic missiles out of the air in flight 200km away. Ultimately $13 million seems reasonable to save a few city blocks in a major city. It just doesn't make sense to use against small arms like disposable drones.

SubiculumCode

Isn't the strategy to nearshore production, and recent moves in South America were potentially done to reduce Chinese/Iranian/Russian influence in those regions?

gumby

Ukraine technological flexibility reflects their organizational incentives. Front line users are in communication with the manufacturers; those same front line users choose the weapon (and vendor) they want, so feedback is rapid and since word gets around, good equipment is quickly adopted and becomes popular until something better replaces it. The US military procurement is the opposite of this. One reason procurement is slow is to avoid fraud.* Ukrainse hasn’t managed to eliminate that. Perhaps there is a balance, when you’re under fire at least. * in the US, procurement fraud looks quite different (e.g. having anpart for your weapon made in every congressional district, a tactic developed for the B-1)

belZaah

Ukraine, for whatever reason, was denied access to the DARPA innovation pipeline early on. Thus, they had to make their own to survive. Now, not only is there something moving much faster, than that flow of innovation but also there’s a hunch of adversaries, who have picked up on it. That’s what you get for the lack of strategic thinking. Your decisions are not terminal, your moves are not the finishing ones. Others get to make theirs as well. And you might not at all like where these moves will take you.

myko

probably a lot more quickly with a future administration that isn't skimming off the top everywhere