Scholars give Defense Dept. failing grade.

• Author: Erwin, Sandra I.
• Position: Science and Technology

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The Pentagon's science advisors confirmed in a recent study what other experts have been saying for a long time: The Defense Department has lost its luster as a technological innovator and has done a poor job managing research programs.

The scathing critique comes from an independent group of scientists from the nation's top universities, including Nobel Prize winners, known as the Jasons. At the request of the Pentagon's research and engineering office, the Jasons focused their summer 2008 report on the department's science and technology programs.

A particularly weak spot for the Pentagon is its declining prestige as a sponsor of leading-edge science and technology, said the report.

The panel concluded that many scientists are souring on defense work as they see military research becoming far less influential to society. By comparison, during the Cold War and the heyday of the U.S. space program, military patronage helped to create many modern scientific disciplines.

Despite an annual budget of more than $11 billion for science and technology projects, the Defense Department is not attracting top talent, mostly because much of the scientific community is turning its attention to non-military fields that are considered more relevant to the world's current challenges, such as energy, food, water, education and public health, said Dan McMorrow, director of the Jason program office. He discussed the preliminary findings of the Jasons' summer study at a recent National Defense Industrial Association "Disruptive Technologies" conference in Washington, D.C.

"There has been a shift in the scientific topics of greatest interest to society," McMorrow said. When Soviet military aggression was deemed the greatest threat to humanity, the science that was relevant to the Defense Department was considered important--nuclear physics, aerospace engineering, electrical and mechanical engineering, he said. An increased interest by scientists in areas that are not immediately relevant to the Defense Department is making it tougher for the Pentagon to attract talent.

The Pentagon's "structurally weak" research organization also is driving away scientists, said McMorrow. "The Defense Department is not effective in coordinating and overseeing the basic research program and funding across the department."

An alarming trend has been the decoupling of the Pentagon's office that oversees defense research and engineering from the "cash flow"...