Strategic System Development and New Technology: Where Should We be Going?

Abstract

Any discussion of strategic system development and technology, focused on the question of where we should be going, must be anchored in something more than abstractions, theoretical constructs or pursuit of technology for its own sake. Consideration must be given to the strategic concepts, political imperatives and constraints, economic limitations, ‘mirror-imaging’ and other factors which have heavily influenced the course of strategic system development. Nor does the present state and process of strategic force development occur in a historical vacuum — though we frequently tend, especially in the United States, to behave otherwise. Some historical sense of the route we have travelled in order to reach our present condition may therefore help to put our choices for the future into somewhat better perspective.