When considering history, it is apparent that the military has always been the driving force behind scientific innovation. The old saying that necessity is the mother of invention rings true with the military, as there is no better form of necessity than the effort to survive. Many examples throughout history have shown the military’s role in promoting new scientific discovery, from gas warfare in World War I to advanced radar in World War II. Even later, nuclear weaponry has been driven by the military. Generals and military leadership have employed top scientists for at least two centuries. This creates something of a problem, though. The scientific community is sometimes counted on to lead the movement toward peace and global harmony, but its connection with the military brings questions about a conflict of interest. The scientific community has shown itself unable to be a leader in that area, and in order for that situation to change, there must be some separation between military leadership and the scientists who empower them.
An important distinction must be made when discussing the role of scientists in helping the military. Scientists cannot necessarily be held accountable for the things that are done with the inventions that they create. To hold scientists to this standard would effectively stifle innovation. After all, one can think of a nefarious purpose for just about any item. The technology used to cure diseases can be used to infect people, too. The technology behind airplanes can be used to create war-faring devices. Even the radiation technology that helps to treat cancer can be utilized by nations looking to bring mass warfare to their neighbors. If scientists were forced to create things that could never be used for a non-peaceful purpose, then scientists would cease invention entirely. This would be highly detrimental to society, so as a people, we accept that some bad will come with the good. The problems come when military personnel do more than just utilize existing technology; they come when the military plays an active role in influencing the type of technologies that are developed.
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World War I has been called by some as the “Chemists’ War” (Rhees, 1992). Not only was science incredibly important, but various militaries around the world poured money into scientific research (MacLeod, 1993). This is at the heart of the conflict of interest. When science is dependent upon the military for its funding, then science can hardly be expected to maintain partiality on the issue of peace. In 1915, the German military invested significantly in the production of chlorine from its prominent dye industry (Whittemore, 1975). This helped to produce the kinds of gasses that could be effective on the battlefields of World War I. Great Britain got into the act, as well, subsidizing this industry in an effort to keep up with the Germans (Russell, 2001). The Germans also contributed significant amounts of money to both state-employed and private physicists, who helped develop the technology that made “U-boats” possible (Jones, 1969).
When most think of World War II, they think of the atomic bomb, which effectively ended the war in the Asian theater (Groueff, 1967). That bomb was only made possible when America invested significantly in the Manhattan Project (Groves, 1983). Likewise, both the Americans and British invested money in radar, as this was important in the sea and in the air (Hughes, 2002). Later, the United States competed in a race with the Soviet Union to develop the best and most fright-inducing technologies (Branscomb, 1977). In the Soviet Union, scientists were actively controlled by the country, as the state socialized the scientific field (Leslie, 1993). While science was technically “free” in the United States, the amount of funding essentially took away the objectivity of the industry.
As long as science is continually funded by the military industrial complex, the scientific community cannot be counted on to promote peace. Simply put, peace and military proliferation are at odds, and when science’s funding is dependent upon developing new weaponry, it becomes difficult for the scientific community to speak out on behalf of peace and global harmony. With that in mind, there are two things that could potentially be done in light of this reality. First, the world could stop looking to the scientific community to promote peace. After all, scientists are very good at developing new strategies and technologies, but they are not necessarily the most articulate advocates for peace. The populace could start to understand that the scientific community brings positives and negatives. While it might bring new innovation that can be used to make the world a better place, its technologies can also be used by those who want to bring war. The better solution, however, would be to create some separation between the scientific community and the military. This is not to say that the military would be prohibited from utilizing science. It would just be that science would not be primarily funded by the military complex. This would give science the freedom to work without the influence and compulsion of the military. Developing alternative funding sources may be difficult, of course. If history teaches anything, it teaches that the militaries around the world are both the most motivated and most capable of funding new research. There would need to be a renewed interest in promoting scientific research by people and organizations who are not directly associated with the military. This could allow the scientific community to take the lead on these issues.
- Branscomb, L. M. (1977). Cold War Science. The Sciences, 17(3), 20-21.
- Groueff, S. (1967). Manhattan Project. Little, Brown, 65.
- Groves, L. R. (1983). Now it can be told: The story of the Manhattan Project. Da Capo Press, 101-111.
- Hughes, J. A. (2002). The Manhattan project: Big science and the atom bomb. Columbia University Press, 76-77.
- Jones, D. P. (1969). The role of chemists in research on war gases in the United States during World War I. University of Wisconsin, 12.
- Leslie, S. W. (1993). The Cold War and American science: The military-industrial-academic complex at MIT and Stanford. Columbia University Press, 9-10.
- MacLeod, R. (1993). The chemists go to war: The mobilization of civilian chemists and the british war effort, 1914-1918. Annals of science, 50(5), 455-481.
- Rhees, D. J. (1992). 93.”The Chemists’ War: The Impact of World War I on the American Chemical Profession.”. Bulletin for the History of Chemistry, (13/14), 40-47.
- Russell, E. (2001). War and nature: fighting humans and insects with chemicals from World War I to Silent Spring. Cambridge University Press, 3-6.
- Whittemore, G. F. (1975). World War I, poison gas research, and the ideals of American chemists. Social Studies of Science, 5(2), 135-163.
