Finally, it is clear that in the German case, as in the British, an early demonstration of the technical feasibility of the turbojet engine made enormous leverage available to those who favored its development… All in all, the Americans seem to have overstated difficulty and underestimated worth on every possible occasion…
There were only two serious proposals for gas turbine propulsion development in the United States before word arrived of the success of the Whittle engine. Each was sponsored by an airframe company, and each began in 1940 after an indeterminate period of preliminary discussion. Rather than proceed with the program on its own, Lockheed approached the Army with a request for a development contract but was unable to find a receptive audience…
American experience in turbojet development before 1945 was dominated by an extreme aversion to risk. Neither Lockheed nor Northrop proved willing to make any substantial research and development investment in their own designs without assurance that the War Department would underwrite virtually all expenditures…
The American experience chiefly serves to demonstrate how unlikely it is that a striking innovation in military aeronautics can get a hearing in the absence of a sound technical foundation. But something may also be said about the existence of dominant alternatives, for in the realm of highly efficient air-cooled reciprocating engines no country was better provided than the United States.
That was the excellent Robert Perry’s “Innovation and Military Requirements: A Comparative Study.”
I think that risk aversion for defense contractors is equally strong today. For example, whereas Lockheed Martin spent $1.2 billion of independent R&D during 2017 (or, 2% of revenues), Google spent $16.6 billion (or nearly 15% of revenues).
Defense contractors are extremely unwilling to sink their earnings into R&D unless it is going to a major defense program which has assured funding in the budget. A fair amount of Lockheed IR&D goes to the F-35, for example, to cover deficiencies (which will then be reimbursed through G&A expenses on their contracts).
For defense contractors, IR&D is almost no risk when it is going to already approved programs. It becomes risky when they are working to market brand new ideas to the military services. But even if those projects fail, the risk is only in slightly higher G&A rates. If defense were more competitive, that could cause them to lose work, but in today’s environment, that outcome is unlikely.
I’d like to see how much IR&D goes to future vs. approved programs. I’d guess most goes to the latter.
One of the big problems, as Robert Perry explained for jet engines, is that bureaucracies are extremely unwilling to take risks, or potentially extremely poor at evaluating concepts. What’s worse, even after technical feasibility was demonstrated, the US failed to pursue the jet engine with vigor.
Our situation today is dire, because technical feasibility cannot be demonstrated until after the entire bureaucracy agrees on it and releases funding. That is the wrong way around. Needless to say, only consensual or common-place ideas will pass the bureaucratic hurdle, or they will be compromised by unvalidated requirement add-ons.
Technical feasibility needs to be pursued in advance of defense-wide consensus, if only because a smart and dedicated technical person believes in the concept. Bureaucratic evaluation can be useful only when real systems are put in front of them in operational environments.
It is very unlikely that defense firms will undertake exploratory projects themselves in advance of the bureaucratic (or political) approval. Why put good money after a risky proposition if you can put it toward a program that (1) is approved and has guaranteed funding, and (2) your company has been in “on the ground floor,” or even has a monopoly after winning the development contract?
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