STEVE PIECZENIK TALKS

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency [DARPA]: The Most Valuable Weapon In The Military Arsenal Determining The Future of America.

In 1973, I attended a Graduate Seminar at MIT on the “Internet and Social Media”. I was told that this course was sponsored by both the CIA and DARPA.  I knew what the CIA was—a highly refined, intellectual institution with officers who had served in the OSS. [contrary to the popular myth of wastrels like Jason Bourne and Jack Ryan]. 

But what was DARPA and this thing called ‘the internet’?

  I soon learned about this extensive world of computer interconnections around the country that would enable universities and military institutions to converse with each other without using a telephone. Then to make matters a little more complex for me that course added the concept that this virtual connectivity would allow every citizen of the world to inter-relate with each other in an ether of binary numbers.

  WOW! I was to say the least baffled, bemused and totally in awe of this incredible futuristic concept of worldwide communications.

But what and who was DARPA? That was a question that befuddled me at the time as well as for decades to come.  I have never met anyone at DARPA.  Maybe it was populated by robots or virtual scientists in a hologram of complex images relating to each other in an alien tongue.  I was both in admiration of DARPA and totally bewildered by it’s existence. 

In the 1980’s with a team of talented writers I was able to create a series of novels based on the concept of the internet and cyberspace. The series was called “Net Force’ created by Tom Clancy and Steve Pieczenik. In that series,  we were able to postulate the following precepts that stemmed from DARPA’s original creation.

 [1] The Nation State was obsolete. National boundaries would eventually disappear and be replaced by the contiguity of cyber relations. In other words, a forum of social discourse would arise in this cyberspace.

[2] Cyberwar would replace ‘blood and guts’ war. So from my novel “Net Force CyberWar” and “CyberTerrorism’ which I was told by some of my military friends in the Cybercommand had influenced the strategic thinking of our country. Whether that was true or not, it was nice to hear. But I always supported the concept presently pronounced by Sec Def Panetta and NSA Director General Keith Alexander that the greatest threat to America is Cyberwar. In my mind and experience that is one hundred per cent true. Actually it’s more than the truth. If people assess the recent damage of the storm Sandy that is nothing to what could happen to our country if we have ‘a cyberattack like Pearl Harbor’ (Panetta quote)

  But back to the fundamental issue of what is DARPA and how did it become so important to the survival and future of America? 

 One should clearly look up it’s origins in Wikipedia (posted earlier for you guys that do your home work) and one can get a detailed history of it’s accomplishments. 

  But from my perspective I want to relate how this unknown military institution was able to create the internet; support robot development; create and develop the cell phone; invent the GPS systems based on Satellite tracking; develop the principles of Cyberwar; formulate the Ballistic Missile Defense Systems; develop lightweight satellites [LIGHT SAT]; and start with the development of a program in 2011 on interstellar travel. 

  So how does this incredible innovative organization buried in the bowels of a bloated Pentagon create, develop and initiate new concepts and products for the American public forty years out?

Contrary to popular myth, the internet and Social media was not pioneered by the likes of Mark Zuckerberg although he makes a good new American hero-geek style.   Anyone with any basic knowledge of the internet and Facebook knew right away that there was no way to commoditize the inter-relationships among the billion users.  Forty years ago, at MIT,  I had already learned that the true value of the internet and social media , as I said funded by the CIA and DARPA, was to create social upheaval and social revolutions. 

So please thank the CIA and DARPA for the “Arab Springs’ that used very instruments and principles initiated by these two very unique intelligence agencies. Not Mark Zuckerberg or any other Silicon Valley self-proclaimed ‘genius’ –that means you guys at Google and Apple and Microsoft.
  Back to why DARPA was and is so creative and essential to the future of our country and to the development of it’s technological superiority. 

  The key characteristic of it’s organization as expounded former DARPA’s Director Tony Tether are the following :

-Small and flexible; only 140 technical professionals.

- DARPA presents itself as a conduit among “100 geniuses connected by a travel agent”. In my opinion, they are quite modest about themselves. 

- Autonomy and freedom from bureaucratic impediments. 

-Eclectic, world-class technical staff and performers; they seek great talents and ideas from industry, universities, government laboratories. 

 - Very little DARPA research is done in government labs. It’s outsourced to industry, universities and individuals. 

-DARPA sustains great teams of researchers from different disciplines that collaborate and share in teams’ advance.

-All projects are organized around innovation-based infusion of fresh thinking and perspectives. It’s also project oriented unlike banking, manufacturing, services which have all become process oriented an non –value -added.

-Key: ACCEPTANCE OF FAILURE---  it encourages trial and error as long as the new idea and out-of –the box concept has a chance of becoming reality.

 --It’s oriented to revolutionary breakthroughs and emphasizes high risk investments and technological innovations that have military and more importantly civilian application.

 DARPA accomplishes these amazing feats all on a budget of 3.2 billion dollars, less than the worthless Goldman Sachs bankers accrued in their collective bonuses for fake, illegal, corrupt transactions—all committed without impunity.

 So my dear readers, You and I have learned about what this amazing little organization that ‘can do’.
DARPA is America’s secret jewel.

Once a retarded Senator named Mansfield passed an Amendment in 1973 that curtailed the amount of money that could be appropriated to defense research. That devastated American science since DARPA was a major funding source for basic science projects at the time. And unfortunately the National Science Foundation [an organization of questionable value] could not make up the difference as they had promised.

  Well my dear readers, let us be extremely grateful for this prototypical American institution that allowed America to become and remain a military and technological superpower.

 Let no one politician interfere with it’s funding nor allow the next President Obama to curtail it’s unique functions. (we all know how much money is wasted, lets stop spending $$ on 19^th century technology!!-strike down the military/industrial monster that sucks away all our tax dollars)

We owe so much to DARPA that I don’t know how to say thanks other than to write this blog and inform my readers about it.

  As for me, it allowed a psychiatrist like me to attend MIT and integrate my psychiatric training with the international relations, propaganda, national character studies, intelligence, force structure, and many other statecrafts.  I must also thank the CIA which at that time understood that the underpinnings of intelligence starts always with understanding the human mind and group psychology.

 Both DARPA and the CIA allowed this psychiatrist to be the first and only one [unfortunately] Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Nixon, Ford, Carter, Bush Sr and serve on the prestigious Policy Planning Board of the State Department. I might add that Rand along with the aforementioned institution refined my studies into an operational capacity as they did for Van Neumann , Nathan Leites, and Richard Solomon.

May DARPA and the new CIA under General Petraeus long live and make our country a better and safer place to live in.  Its time we “course-correct” our path, use our resources wisely to secure a bright future for America.  Let’s ensure we “weed out” the destructive internal forces (you know, the ones I usually talk about) so we can function productively in the 21^st century information age.

Thank you , my gentlemen for having been the recipient of your accomplishments.