4 ms·

> DoD report to Congress Reader beware. Reports to Congress are highly politicized -- both the Department itself and various bureaucrats within are kissing the

> DoD report to Congress Reader beware. Reports to Congress are highly politicized -- both the Department itself and various bureaucrats within are kissing the ring in hopes of protecting/increasing funding. You can safely expect these reports to mention climate change, green energy, diversity, etc. much more often for the next four years. And guess what? The best office politicians serving life terms in the DoD will make sure those reports direct funds in ways that benefit their priorities. POTUS in 2020 was protectionist, so DoD tells a story about how they and their private sector allies need money and tell it in a way that aligns with that protectionism. The main thesis about why money is needed matches the biases of the person with the pulpit, and then the report helpfully suggests exactly how to achieve that goal that we all of course agree should be the goal. In 2020, onshoring manufacturing. In 2021, maybe still onshoring but maybe play up the whole climate thing a lot more. "Caveat Emptor" is merely a warning, not necessarily an indict of the product. Reader beware.

brutusborn 5y ago
Although there is definitely bias, the facts choosen in the quote are alarming regardless. Only a couple of the major world tooling companies existing in the largest economy in the world is significant.
- throwawaygh 5y ago
  Ironic. That’s actually exactly the portion of the quote that made me post the comment.
XorNot 5y ago
Except there's no point I can recall in the history of strategic policymaking where anyone has concluded "yes, having our manufacturing base be outsourced to foreign powers is a sensible decision with no serious impacts on the actual or expected availability of defense capability". This is pretty much an obvious problem: if you don't have your own arms facilities, then you've got a problem. If the facilities aren't across a land border but across an ocean, then you've got a bigger problem. And if you can't reasonably expect to be able to expand capacity by internal policymaking ("we need to open 5 more factories") then you've got an even bigger problem.
- mellavora 5y ago
  part of why Sweden still makes jet fighters and otherwise maintains a pretty good arms industry.
- throwawaygh 5y ago
  > Except there's no point I can recall in the history of strategic policymaking where anyone has concluded "yes, having our manufacturing base be outsourced to foreign powers is a sensible decision with no serious impacts on the actual or expected availability of defense capability". Right. Including in the United States over the past 40+ years. The United States does manufacture its weapons domestically, it does stockpile reserves of key components, and it does require domestic manufacturing for key inputs. The linked report doesn't even contest any of this. It's to a "renaissance" in arms manufacturing. The question is less "is this a real problem in the abstract" and much more "is this a real problem that the US actually has?" This is really a bit like saying "if a country can't grow its own food then its people will starve". The problem is not with explicit argument, which is of course common sense. The problem is with the implicit implication ("give us more money for farm subsidies or you will starve"... well, wait, does the US have a food security problem? Do we already have funds in place to help mitigate that risk? Are those risk reduction programs effective? Is more risk reduction necessary? And is the specific spending that's being requested to nominally reduce risk actually going to do so?). Which is to say, all of this comes before asking the even more important question: even if we do are out-sourcing our arms manufacturing (we aren't, but even if we were...), will following DoD's recommendations make us less reliant on other nations? Or are we just just pissing money away into some DoD beaurocrat's useless jobs program?

brutusborn 5y ago

Although there is definitely bias, the facts choosen in the quote are alarming regardless. Only a couple of the major world tooling companies existing in the largest economy in the world is significant.

throwawaygh 5y ago
Ironic. That’s actually exactly the portion of the quote that made me post the comment.

XorNot 5y ago

Except there's no point I can recall in the history of strategic policymaking where anyone has concluded "yes, having our manufacturing base be outsourced to foreign powers is a sensible decision with no serious impacts on the actual or expected availability of defense capability". This is pretty much an obvious problem: if you don't have your own arms facilities, then you've got a problem. If the facilities aren't across a land border but across an ocean, then you've got a bigger problem. And if you can't reasonably expect to be able to expand capacity by internal policymaking ("we need to open 5 more factories") then you've got an even bigger problem.

mellavora 5y ago
part of why Sweden still makes jet fighters and otherwise maintains a pretty good arms industry.
throwawaygh 5y ago
> Except there's no point I can recall in the history of strategic policymaking where anyone has concluded "yes, having our manufacturing base be outsourced to foreign powers is a sensible decision with no serious impacts on the actual or expected availability of defense capability". Right. Including in the United States over the past 40+ years. The United States does manufacture its weapons domestically, it does stockpile reserves of key components, and it does require domestic manufacturing for key inputs. The linked report doesn't even contest any of this. It's to a "renaissance" in arms manufacturing. The question is less "is this a real problem in the abstract" and much more "is this a real problem that the US actually has?" This is really a bit like saying "if a country can't grow its own food then its people will starve". The problem is not with explicit argument, which is of course common sense. The problem is with the implicit implication ("give us more money for farm subsidies or you will starve"... well, wait, does the US have a food security problem? Do we already have funds in place to help mitigate that risk? Are those risk reduction programs effective? Is more risk reduction necessary? And is the specific spending that's being requested to nominally reduce risk actually going to do so?). Which is to say, all of this comes before asking the even more important question: even if we do are out-sourcing our arms manufacturing (we aren't, but even if we were...), will following DoD's recommendations make us less reliant on other nations? Or are we just just pissing money away into some DoD beaurocrat's useless jobs program?