US Defense Industrial Base: strong, but at risk

Abstract

The Defense Industrial Base (DIB) is a combination of both government and commercial organizations that produces military munitions and equipment. Since the successful surge of US defense industrial might in World War II, the DIB has been slowly eroding. During this slow decline over the past seventy-five years, some critical vulnerabilities have emerged in the DIB. Three of these vulnerabilities in the DIB are: sole sources of production for military equipment and ammunition, decreased funding for infrastructure maintenance and modernization, and reliance on foreign sources for key components and chemical compounds. These vulnerabilities increase the risk of not being able to meet potential surge requirements generated by a future high-intensity conflict with a peer adversary.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
May 24, 2018
Accession Number
AD1071571

Entities

People

  • Shane M. Upton

Organizations

  • School of Advanced Military Studies

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Counter WMD
  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Space
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Ammunition
  • Base Closures
  • Chemical Compounds
  • Commerce
  • Contingency Operations (Military)
  • Governments
  • Logistics
  • Maintenance
  • Military Equipment
  • Munitions
  • National Security
  • Second World War
  • Small Arms
  • Supply Chain
  • Vulnerability
  • War
  • War Colleges

Readers

  • Economics
  • Geospatial Intelligence and Artificial Intelligence Analytics
  • Munitions and Ordnance Engineering