US Manufacturing: Once a Strength, Now a Liability

Not since WWII has private industry carried such outsized influence on national security strategy and policy. Now more than ever, the success or failure of foreign affairs?increasingly depends on corporate leaders' decisions.

And it’s not the obvious players like shipbuilders, weapons and munition manufacturers that are calling the shots. The global expansion of pure digital plays, particularly the software industry, holds outsized strategic sway. Wartime essential companies today are not necessarily household names. From the startups creating logistic software that fuel manufacturing efficiencies to digital relay software that facilitate energy and telecom transition, these companies are going to have to pick sides and make significant operational adjustments very soon.

Business decisions made today are affecting America’s standing in the world tomorrow. Who are the executives making these decisions? Are they informed enough on the nuances of both regional geopolitics and great power competition to make informed decisions? And do they have the nation’s or their shareholder’s best interest at heart? Are there cases where patriotism and capitalism are mutually exclusive?

Industry has always been a defining element of U.S. power projection. Wartime authorities like the Second War Powers and Defense Production Acts can be resurrected to enable the USG to compel private industry to support surge manufacturing of goods and raw materials central to the war effort. America’s ability to shift manufacturing capacity and capabilities to rapidly produce and move essential supplies really was key to victory in WWII.

But that was a simpler time with little or no dependence on foreign components in supply chains. Today, even among "Made In America" products, almost nothing is produced without a physical component or manufacturing process that happens offshore.

This is especially true for software. Commercial software re-uses code from open source libraries and incorporates code written by and licensed from other software companies. It has been decades since software has been made the old-fashioned way: With a small onsite team of coders writing only original code. Today, the code that you’re looking at right now—the code that powers LinkedIn, that powers your internet provider, that powers your laptop-- it contains code that was written by coders from all over the world, including Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran.

Who is in charge of validating the integrity and security of this code? No one.

Could there be surprises laying in wait? Absolutely. Supply chain sabotage of essential goods and services is a viable battle tactic. Soon software supply chain sabotage will enter the theater.

Could BODs and C-Suites require line-by-line validation of their software product’s code? They could, but very few do because it’s time and cost intensive, and also because code is dynamic (i.e. software is never finished). Note: Nemesis Global’s software contains no open source or otherwise licensed software. We’re 100% OG.

America is in the early stages of what is likely to be a three-front war. What will happen when wartime surge manufacturing is compromised by delays or inaccessibility of critical supply chain components that aren’t availably domestically? What happens when our software is suddenly glitchy? What happens when the two scenarios happen simultaneously?

Answer: American logistics will seize up and our forward deployed troops will not have adequate resources to win. As long as private industry and their fiduciary imperative is unchecked, this constraint will have negative impact on critical wartime supply chains with cascading detrimental effect on military strategy, tactics, operations and freedom of maneuver.

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