Where Does Advanced Military Technology Come From?

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Sean D. Smith
  • Minot Air Force Base Public Affairs
MINOT AIR FORCE BASE, N.D. --  In 1958, President Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered the development of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, though at the time it was called the Advanced Research Projects Agency. The creation of DARPA was a response to the successful Soviet launch of Sputnik, which caused considerable insecurity in the West about Soviet technological superiority.

DARPA's role was to keep United States military technology ahead of the technology being employed by America's enemies. In DARPA's words, the agency's mission is to prevent technological surprises such as Sputnik, and also to create technological surprises for the enemy.

Research and development funded by DARPA has had impact not only for the military, but in technology used day to day, mostly in computing, information technology and network infrastructure.

Over the years, DARPA has been involved in dozens of projects. Some are well-known, like the General Atomics MQ-1 Predator, an unmanned aerial vehicle in use by the United States Air Force and the Central Intelligence Agency. The Predator has seen extensive use in Iraq and Afghanistan, and accumulated more than 1 million flight hours.

Less mainstream projects include the ArcLight program, a missile system meant for naval vessels that would dramatically increase the range of effective missile delivery, allowing targeting virtually anywhere in the world. Such a system would have brought the capabilities of these ships to the same level as that of ballistic missile-equipped submarines, but the ArcLight program was ultimately cancelled.

DARPA funds challenges intended to stimulate development of powerful technology. The DARPA Grand Challenge was intended to create the first autonomous ground vehicle that could successfully complete an off-road course and other environments.

The DARPA Spectrum Challenge was a tournament to improve radio technology, and the DARPA Network Challenge required participating teams to locate 10 red balloons placed around the country, and report their locations to DARPA. The Network Challenge ended after just 9 hours, much more quickly than DARPA anticipated, signaling the increasingly powerful role that connected technology can play in practical tasks.

The DARPA Shredder Challenge included nearly 9,000 teams competing to develop effective methods of piecing together shredded documents to recover intelligence.

Current DARPA projects include cancer research and thought-controlled prosthetics along with experimental weapons and technology intended to augment individual soldiers in a deployed environment, like the XOS powered exoskeleton. DARPA is also behind research and development of multiple robotics programs, and even aircraft and spacecraft.

DARPA belongs to the Department of Defense, and its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia.