U.S. Defense Industry and Technological Progress in the 20th Century

Introduction

Technology is one of the key features of any culture and civilization. The limits of a specific group's technology in large part dictate the degree and manner of their interaction with their environment, with other people, and among each other. The technological innovation of the plow allowed for far more rapid rates of agricultural growth, enabling the establishment of the first large population centers, which in turn led to the development of the first cities. New methods of metalworking enabled a move away from tools made of stone, wood, and other naturally abundant materials toward those made of lighter, stronger, and more malleable metals. Eras of human civilization are often labeled by their salient technologies — the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, and the modern Information Age — illustrating the importance of technology in every human being's daily life.

One of the major driving forces behind technological progress has been the need, or at least the perceived need, for defensive tools and weapons of aggression. The Iron and Bronze Ages were spurred onward by a need for lighter, stronger weapons that could inflict more damage more cheaply; chariots were developed as war machines; and many modern advancements in technology can be seen as the result of military progress, for better or for worse. The growth of the human species has led to increasingly scarce resources, and those resources are put to increasingly sophisticated uses in attempts to secure more resources from other groups.

In the twentieth century, it was not only the development of specific objects and technologies, but the increased military industrialization and the process of creating and producing technologies itself, that in large part contributed to the advancement of society through science and technology. This is not immediately apparent from a cursory examination of twentieth-century technologies: Henry Ford revolutionized industry with the assembly-line process in a private and civilian endeavor, and other achievements in the technological process were also made outside the realm of the military. An examination of the trends of technology explosions, however, demonstrates the influence that the military had on society in terms of its acquisition of technology, its appreciation of growing technological capabilities, and the overall functioning of society through technology.

The Aftermath of World War

War has many outcomes, some far less desirable than others, but the twentieth century produced some rather interesting and unusual effects in addition to those more commonly expected. Both World War I and World War II were followed by periods of rapid technological innovation and expansion in the years immediately after their close; the 1920s and the 1950s were both times of then-unprecedented prosperity and growth, economically and technologically (Pursell 2007, pp. 282–5). The relationship of this fact to the militarization of the preceding decades is somewhat complex, but essentially the nationwide mobilization and common industrial and technological goals of wartime were allowed new freedom to flourish once the conflicts ended.

A host of new technologies emerged or were developed during the First World War, many of which were solely utilized by the military but others of which would go on to have profound civilian applications. The armored tank, the bolt-action rifle, and many other new weapons — or important technological innovations added to older weapons — were all created during World War I (Davidson 2009). This explosion of technology was due in large part to the industrialization of the nineteenth century, many of the systems and processes of which had been perfected in the early twentieth century. In addition, the sheer need for such developments, driven by the changing nature of warfare toward conflicts of pure attrition, was a major force behind the military innovations that came to the fore during this period (Davidson 2009).

This high technological drive continued to have an effect throughout the 1920s in both direct and indirect ways. Though airplanes were still very new during the war, many different innovations in weaponry as well as in design and engineering were achieved in producing planes for the war effort. This led to a rapid rise in the civilian aircraft industry following the close of the war, when manufacturers and innovators needed new markets (Highbeam 2010). Indirectly, the technological and industrial endeavors of the First World War led to an increased emphasis on the importance of scientific knowledge and practical application throughout the country. When there was no longer a war effort toward which to direct these energies, the fervor did not die away but rather found itself applied in new directions — such as crop dusting, the increasing diversification of automobiles, and many other innovations (Highbeam 2010).

The 1920s ended with the market crash and the onset of the Great Depression, and though technology continued to advance, its progress was necessarily slowed during that period. World War II saw a similar resurgence in technological and industrial innovation, however, and the following decade of the 1950s saw a major increase in the number and affordability of many new or newly accessible household technologies. Among these was the all-important television, which would change the way the world sees itself and understands the complex relationships that govern it through its profound communicative power (SCNET 2010). Computer science also developed rapidly during the war, largely as a means of encrypting messages and attempting to decrypt enemy communications. Though it would be several more decades before computers became a ubiquitous feature of everyday life, the true beginnings of this massive technological change can be unequivocally traced to World War II.

This understanding of technological developments and their relationship to the military actions of the two World Wars is not wholly accepted, nor is it the only explanation for the identified technology explosions that has been put forward. It has even been argued that the World Wars had a depressive effect on technology in most sectors, and that the technology explosions of the 1920s and 1950s are actually evidence of this. These technologies could have emerged sooner, this argument contends, had the World Wars not consumed such a large share of the materials and human resources of the preceding decades.

Conclusion

The inevitability of war is a matter of great debate amongst philosophers and historians, but the fact that war has existed for all of recorded human history is indisputable. As war necessarily creates matters of life and death, often on scales unimaginable in other circumstances, it is perhaps unsurprising that war and military actions are such major driving forces behind the advancement of technology. Technology is still changing the face of warfare and of daily life in the current era.