Is America's Military Edge Slipping?

Imagine a world in which the U.S. and the rest of us could not count on America having the dominant military technology.  Put another way, imagine China, not the U.S., having the "latest and greatest" things that go boom.  Imagine us being the technological underdogs, vulnerable to a less than friendly country's superiority.  Imagine the arm twisters becoming the arm twistees. Ooh, ooh, child.

The head of America's military science & technology apparatus, DARPA or the Defense and Research Projects Agency, warns that America's technological lead could be wiped out before long.

Less than a year on the job as director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Arati Prabhakar is issuing a wake-up call. The Pentagon must stop living in past technological glory and prepare for a world in which U.S. adversaries are innovating faster and at a much lower cost than the Defense Department.

“Our research, innovation, and entrepreneurial capacity is the envy of the world, but others are building universities, labs, and companies with vigor and determination, and some are seeking to harm or confiscate our own capacity.”

Not for nothing did the Bush Doctrine reserve to America the right to pre-emptively attack any nation or group of nations that dared to overtake American military supremacy.

Ms. Prabhakar also presents globalization as a threat to American security.

 “Today our military systems are critically reliant on technologies that in some cases are available to everybody around the world, and in some cases are actually not even made anymore in the United States,” she said. “That's a trend that we expect will continue [and] we think that other nations will continue to grow their capabilities in terms of technology.”