ABSTRACT

Of central significance in the British state’s inability to match desired military capability to available resources is the consistently increasing cost of providing the desired capability. Cost increases in military equipment have been far sharper over the past thirty years than the norm in the civil economy. Costs express the resources devoted to and utilised in the development and production of equipment; technological improvement over previous equipment requires more resources – people, machinery, materials, plant – per unit of equipment. The problem for military planners is not only that increased costs mean less pieces of equipment to provide the overall capability desired, but that increased sophistication does not necessarily mean increased effectiveness. The advance of military technology can be constrained, such military exotica and other similar projects will become operational systems.