Vanguard Magazine

Gripen E. Photo: Saab 14 OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2020 www.vanguardcanada.com innovation to the perceived multi-engine need, or the adherence to the industrial benefits offset- ting model from the 1980s. The pace of change, today, signals the requirement for a broader understanding of the emerging environment, from many viewpoints, not just these singular technological or eco- nomic ones that would seem to suggest a much shallower analysis of innovation. Marketplace dynamics alone surely must mean the needs of the 1980s were much different than those of today. Is it right to apply the same IRB model to current circumstances, or should we not be more innovative? The Hornet was built more than 40 years ago and was slated for replacement nearly 15 years ago. Incremental capabil- ity adjustments have added to the aircraft's utility, but this scale of change is anticipat- ed to be managed within the status quo defined by the current organizational, technological, socio-cultural, and politico- military-economic paradigms, in a manner seemingly oblivious to evolutionary and sometimes revolutionary forces that can emerge. Life-extension decisions, while impor- tant, might only add to the tension and dissonance arising when the acquisi- tion of new equipment is more essential. The need for more effective capabilities deemed essential for operating under new and evolving circumstances goes ignored when logical incrementalism, not radical innovation wins the day. Choosing be- tween the Gripen, the Super Hornet, or the Lightning II is about opting for a po- tential innovation, the measurement or limits of which involves determining just how resilient, adaptive, and forward lean- ing each may be. We need to understand better where each might be on the inno- vation spectrum unique to our circum- stances. Evaluating the three Contenders What I am proposing, of course, is not easy. Were it more so, our collective un- derstanding of the process of innovation would lead much more readily to effective decisions. Each of the three contenders deserves to be evaluated to determine 1) from a political perspective, the extent of the contribution each can make to pro- tecting Canadians and our specific inter- ests over at least the next 40 years, given the precedent we have set with the CF- 188 since 1982; 2) from an economic per- spective, the impact of acquiring each of them will have on the domestic and inter- simply because maritime forces feared ob- solescence in the face of an expanding stra- tegic missile and bombing capability. If we were to leverage all that, in terms of the advent of the armed helicopter, or the fielding of a nuclear-missile-carrying underwater craft, we risk losing sight of the impact on land forces, too, manifest in the creation of pentomic divisions, and other similar restructuring initiatives in the other services. A third revolution "took root in the 1980s, when electronics, combined with sensors, computers, and communica- tions systems heralded unfounded levels of intelligence collection, which today we label the C4ISR revolution." It may now be clearer to the reader that the fusion of sensors on the Gripen, Super Hornet, and Lightning II isn't really the be-all and end- all of the innovation process on which we should be focusing. At least, this is the cautionary message Rosen, Freedman, and Guttman would seem to prefer we heed. Be More innovative? Rosen, like Machiavelli, emphasizes that "all social innovation is difficult," explain- ing as with political and military innovation the issue is one of a problem of bureaucra- cy, which is all the more encompassing. In the affected bureaucracy are untold num- bers of camps or tribes invested in one or more aspects of the legacy technology or capability in question. Quite often, some may be so invested their very identity is rooted therein. These are the ones who prove the most inflexible, or the least adap- tive. Some conservatism or aversion to risk is understandable, but intransigence can be debilitating. In the present context, we need to ask about the value of holding fast F/A-18 Super Hornet. Photo: Boeing

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