acquisition, ash carter, Technology, Innovation and Modern War, department of defense, dod, hacking for defense, intlpol 340, joe felter, kill chain, max boot, military innovation, ms&e296, raj shah, requirements, stanford, Steve blank, China

1. Technology, Innovation,
and Modern War
INTLPOL 340; MS&E 296
Steve Blank, Joe Felter, Raj Shah
Lecture 1

2. “The problem is not lack of money, lack of technology,
and certainly not lack of capable and committed people
in the US government, military and private industry.
No, the real problem is a lack of imagination.”
Christian Brose, Kill Chain 2020

3. Agenda
• Teaching Team
• Class Logistics
• The Course at A Glance
• Ash Carter
• Lesson 2 - coming attractions

4. Student Intro
Name, Discipline, Interest

5. Teaching Team

6. Steve Blank
Co-creator Lean Startup
Co-author Hacking for Defense
Member Defense Business Board
Created I-Corps and I-Corps @ NSA
Air Force Veteran
8 startups
● Semiconductors
● Supercomputers
Details at www.steveblank.com
● Enterprise software
● Military intelligence

7. Joe Felter
● William J. Perry Fellow, CISAC/FSI
● Hoover Institution, National Security Task Force
● Fmr US Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense
● Coauthor Hacking for Defense
● Senior Advisor, Defense Innovation Unit
● US Army Ranger and Special Forces (ret)

8. Raj Shah
● Visiting Fellow at Hoover / CISAC
● Hoover Institution, National Security
Task Force
● Startup CEO and investor
● Former Managing Partner, Defense
Innovation Unit
● F-16 pilot w/multiple combat tours

9. Class Designer
Andrew Powell
● Stanford GSB Alum (Class of 2020)
● EdTech Startup Founder and CEO
● Hacking4Defense 2019 - Team Learn
to Win
● Leading AFWERX SBIR Direct to Phase
II contract to deploy L2W in USAF and
Navy operational environments

10. Class TAs
Nikita Demir
● BS / MS in Computer
Science, focus in AI/ML
● Hacking4Defense class of
2019
● Interned this summer at
Catapult Ventures advising
on AI/Robotics
● BS in Science, Technology,
and Society
● Hacking4Defense class of
2019
● Experience in Cybersecurity
and Investment Banking
Foster Karmon

11. Civilian and Military Liaisons
Lt Col Denny R. Davies
U.S. Air Force (Hoover
NSAF)
LtCol Kenneth J. Del
Mazo
U.S. Marine Corps
(Hoover NSAF)
Mr. Chase Beamer
U.S. Department of
State (Hoover NSAF)
LTC Edward Cuevas
U.S. Army (Freeman
Spogli Institute CISAC)
LTC Eldridge R.
Singleton
U.S. Army (Hoover
NSAF)
Lt Col Steven Skipper
U.S. Air Force (Hoover
NSAF)
CDR John “Jack”
Souders
U.S. Coast Guard
(Hoover NSAF)
CDR Jeffrey Vanak
U.S. Navy (Hoover
NSAF)
LTC Jim Wiese
U.S. Army (Hoover
NSAF)

12. Class Logistics

13. Recording/Guests
This Zoom Class will be recorded
Guests
• All potential virtual guests require prior approval. Please an
email to Joe Felter with the guest’s name, affiliation and
visit purpose
• If you’re online now and not a student please use the chat
room to introduce yourself now: Name, affiliation and who
invited you.

14. Class Facts
• Tuesdays and Thursday 4:30 - 5:50 pm Pacific
• Sept 15 – Nov 19th
• Office hours by appointment
• 4 credits

15. Class Schedule
Part I: History, Strategy and Challenges
Sep 15: Course Introduction
Sep 17: History of Defense Innovation
Sep 22: DoD 101
Sep 24: US Defense Strategies and Plan
Sep 29: Technology, Ethics and War
Oct 1: Congress & the power of the purse
Part II: Military Applications, Operational
Concepts, Organization and Strategy
AI and Machine Learning
Oct 6 & 8: Introduction and Applications
Autonomy
Oct 13 & 15 Introduction and Applications
Cyber
Oct 20: Introduction and Applications
Space
Oct 27: Introduction and Applications
Part III: Building a plan (Group project)
How to build a plan for future war
Nov 3: Conops planning
Nov 5: Budget and Innovation
Nov 10: Team working with DoD Mentors
Group Presentations and Critiques
Nov 12: Groups 1-2
Nov 17: Groups 2-4
Course Reflections
Nov 19: Defending Our Vision for the Future

16. The Big Picture

17. Empires Rise and Fall
Source: Ray Dalio Principles

18. National Power
• Diplomacy
• Information
• Military
• Economics
• Acronym is DIME

19. Definition of a Weapons System
• In the 20th century it typically meant a gun, tank, plane, ship,
missile, bomb, spacecraft
• Most often something designed to have a kinetic affect
• In the 21st century – and in this class – weapons systems will
often be non-kinetic – cyber, disinformation, AI & machine
learning, autonomy, space
• All which can win wars without killing people
• How will they be used to sustain the other parts of DIME?

20. National Dominance Is Transient
• 1945 -1991 Bipolar world – U.S. and Soviet Union
• 1992 -2018 25+ years U.S. as the dominant global power
• 2018 - National Defense Strategy 2+3

21. How Is Dominance Lost?
• Lose a War
• Miss a technology transition
• Miss new operational concepts
• Lose Allies
• Declining economic power
• Declining interest in global affairs
• Internal/civil conflicts

22. How Is Dominance Lost?
• Lose a War
• Miss a technology transition
• Miss new operational concepts
• Lose Allies
• Declining economic power
• Declining interest in global affairs
• Internal/civil conflicts
This class

23. Why Do We Care?

24. Why Do We Care?
Crimea, Eastern Ukraine, Tibet, Hong Kong
or ask the Uyghurs

25. 2018 National Defense Strategy “The 2+3”
• Wakeup call to the Dept of Defense
• U.S. was focused on counterterrorism since 9/11/2001
• Meanwhile 2 Global threats emerged
• A rearmed Russia, and China now a peer competitor
• And 3 other threats
• North Korea and Iran as regional threats and non-nation states
• Compounded by rapid technological change
• AI/ML, Autonomy, Cyber, Space, Hypersonics, Directed energy…

26. The Course At A Glance

27. This Class Has Three Parts
1. How does technology turn into weapons?
• How do they get acquired, deployed and used to win wars?
2. What impact will AI/Machine Learning, Autonomy, Cyber
and Space have on war?
• How will they be used?
3. How would you acquire, deploy and use a new technology
• in a real scenario

28. New Weapons: the Path to Deployment
Budget 3
Can we afford it?
1 Requirements Process is called the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS)
2 Defense Acquisition System (DAS)
3 Budget Process is called the Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution System (PPBE)
Requirements 1
What do we need?
Acquisition 2
How do we buy it?
F-35
Ford Carrier
Columbia Sub

29. New Weapons: the Path to Deployment
Budget 3
Can we afford it?
1 Requirements Process is called the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS)
2 Defense Acquisition System (DAS)
3 Budget Process is called the Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution System (PPBE)
Requirements 1
What do we need?
Acquisition 2
How do we buy it?Theory

31. Practice

32. Requirements & Acquisition
Top-down Central Planning
,
• Weapons Requirements
• Years to get defined, detailed to an excruciating level
• Service and contractor-driven/ Negligible impact of commercial tech
• Acquisition process:
• Waterfall process, assuming status quo for needs decades ahead
• Focus on political risk reduction (fraud prevention, jobs in every state,
lobbyist driven, etc.)
• Oversight agencies GAO, DoDIG, the audit agencies
• part of the problem assuring compliance with bad strategy

33. Requirements & Acquisition
Top-down Central Planning
,
• Weapons Requirements
• Years to get defined, detailed to an excruciating level
• Service and contractor-driven/ Negligible impact of commercial tech
• Acquisition process:
• Waterfall process, assuming status quo for needs decades ahead
• Focus on political risk reduction (fraud prevention, jobs in every state,
lobbyist driven, etc.)
• Oversight agencies GAO, DoDIG, the audit agencies
• part of the problem assuring compliance with bad strategy
Required us to predict the future -
for decades

34. Doctrine and Operational Concepts
• Having an existing weapon doesn’t describe how they are used to fight
or win a war
• How weapons are used are described in Doctrine
• Doctrine provides the basis of operationalizing the use of a weapon. Not just
how, but who mans it, how do you sustain it, etc..
• Operational concepts are the Minimum Viable Products of the practical
application of a doctrine against a specific enemy in a specific environment.
• New adversaries can create the need for a new doctrine
• ie. 2006 Counterinsurgency doctrine
• New classes of disruptive tech/weapons can create the need for new
doctrine
• We can’t create doctrine against new technology fast enough

35. Monopoly on Power + War on Terror =
Strategic Complacency
• 1992 -2001 Unipower
• 2001- 2018 War on Terror
• Our adversaries had less capable weapons
• Existing Strategic Doctrine/Operational Concepts
• New tactical doctrine – Counterinsurgency
• No national economic sacrifice
• Incremental strategic weapons Improvements
• F-35/Ford-class carriers/B-21/Columbia SSBN
• Innovative tactical improvements
• Reaper/Predator, etc.

36. Incremental Improvement Along
Traditional S-Curves
Debugging
Shakedown
Forrestal-Class
Carriers
Nimitz-Class
Carriers
Ford-Class
Carriers
Shakedown
…
S-Curves Insufficient to understand impact to doctrine

37. Result - Incremental Changes In Doctrine
Doctrine
Incremental weapons
improvements
Refine existing doctrine

38. Result - Existing Contractors Favored
Doctrine
Sam
e
Contractors
Incremental weapons
improvements
Contractor
s

39. New Tech Creates New Doctrine
Disruption in tech forces changes in doctrine
New
Doctrine
Disruptive tech/weapons

40. New Tech Creates New Contractors
New
Doctrine
New
Contractors
Disruptive tech/weapons

41. Impact of New Technologies

42. Visionaries See Over the Horizon
• They can see technology that looks like a toy and imagine it fully
formed a decade out
• Able to form new operating concepts against new
threats/opportunities
• Andrew Marshall ONA, Admiral Rickover, Elon Musk- Tesla/SpaceX
• Blitzkrieg (Von Manstein), AirLand Battle (Creighton Abrams)
• Then rapidly build backwards to get there
• Executors dismiss them
• Because most visionaries are hallucinating
• But the few that are right, change the world or win wars

43. The Course At A Glance
Part 2: What Impact will AI/Machine Learning,
Autonomy, Cyber and Space have on war?
And where do we find and acquire that tech?

48. DoD not designed to buy agilely

49. Especially in software

50. Article 1 and Congress

51. 2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020

52. 2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
On-time budget
Late budget
TBD

53. Change is happening, but still early and fragile
Source: Govini, Evaluating the Innovative Potential of Other Transaction Authority Investments
https://www.govini.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Govini-OTA-Innovation-Potential.pdf
DoD OTA contract growth ($ & quantity)

54. The Course At A Glance
Part 3: New Operational Concepts

55. New Technologies and Applications
Artificial Intelligence
Machine Learning
Autonomy
Cyber
Space
Commercial Applications
Military Applications

58. Guest Speaker: Dr. Ash Carter