Nanotechnology and the Military

Transistors, integrated circuits, computers and the Internet were all the result of expensive and focused military research and development activities. Former US President Dwight Eisenhower used the term “military-industrial complex” to describe the intimate relationship between politics, industry, and national defense that formed during World War II.

With the end of the Cold War in 1989, military spending has continued to be a dominant part of many industrialized countries' budgets and today, the US accounts for about two-thirds of the global expenditures for military research and development. The US military first invested in nanotechnology research in the early 1980s with ultra-submicron electronics and then was a significant funder of the development of scanning probe microscopy. The US Army is contributing $50 million over five years, and private industry is contributing almost as much, to develop battle suits and other technologies.