Hey another history question for you: What do you think about JFK's comments on the military industrial complex prior to his untimely death?
you'll have to refresh my memory about JFK...I remember eisenhour making those comments..
Here's my opinion...not knowing about president's comments....defense companies are like every other...they are in business to make money..either for individual owners or shareholders.
Most of them, the large ones have hired former officer who understand the requirements/accusation systems, and because of their former service they have access to a lot of the active duty officers ..and that's throughout the force, not just the Pentagon...I have found that anyone who has been in combat understand the needs of soldiers who might face similar situations.. there is a sense of duty, honor, country inbred.
Now companies do try to convince the military to require/acquire systems that are not in the Pentagon budget...I'val already posted about the Patriot system...it was originally designed soley as an anti aircraft system, but the manufacturer devoted a way to use the same missile system, make some modifications and turn it into an anti aircraft and an anti tactical ballistic missile system...same assembly line, just modified. The Army was not interested...so the manufacturer worked within the system...executive and legislative systems to get Congressional R&D funding..the rest is history.
and there are mulitple stories about General Dynamics working the Michigan and other Congressional delegations to add funding for tanks that the army did not want...same with the A10 aircraft that the air force has been trying to kill for years.
So in a nutshell the defense industry is not a passive participant in the process.
But, if there are problems it's how the services procure systems...it's a long drawn out process, the requirements folks ask for systems with technologies that don't exist, they change the requirements (often) during the development process, the R&D process takes too long, and contracting is cumbersome with mostly cost plus or cost plus fixed fee contracts...because no company is going to "bet the company" on a fixed price contract when even the required technology has not been developed.
And don't forget, defense purchases are also social projects with requires "set asides", normally 15%, going to small business or minority owned or women owned,business.
And of course we shouldn't forget that members of Congress also play...There is an inherrent desire to protect jobs in the district/state...that a reason why really large programs seek out their supply chains in each of the 50 states.
So the military industrial complex includes a lot more elements that just the defense companies...
Hope this helps.