Posted by Joseph Murphy on December 19, 2002 at 13:14:23:

In Reply to: Re: link capability & performance posted by Lauri Gröhn on December 19, 2002 at 11:45:58:

Lauri:
Military doesn't create much knowledge, from outward appearances. However, they are quite the 'enabler'! And they are the prolific 'learning organization'!
Militaries, the world over, spend $B if not $T of dollars in R&D. And at the end of the day, the action on the field may not have developed any new knowledge, save how poorly equipped you are. But some of the toughest lessons learned (at the expense of human life) certainly drove the need for it!
The A-bomb! How different life may have been if the other side had the knowledge first...hmm!
There are tons of other examples, but I can summarize thus: in business we worry about the livelihood of our company, our workers and our investors. Strategically, resources expended towards R&D will provide us with long term sustainability, or a competitive advantage or two.
But in the military business, it is life and death. Knowledge takes on a whole new dimension.
As far as military not being knowlege workers, you'd be suprised how many new theories and applications have been developed in communications, simply because a need to be better existed...! And this is one area, where militaries are being transformed today!
I'm not beating a military beat here, by no means. Napoleon struggled with ballistics, in his day, because many of this guns just weren't very accurate. So much of modern ballistic theory was developed from lessons learned on his way to defeat!
You're partially right in assessing that militaries, on the battle field, most times act of available knowlege. But many of the lessons learned, at the expense of human life, formed theories on new ways of doing things. Otherwise, we'd be still locked in the trenches...!

Joe.. :o)

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