https://arab.news/275xr
• Iranian strikes on radar systems reveal gaps in the US-led missile defense network protecting Gulf infrastructure
• GCC unity and defense reforms are urgently needed to shield Vision 2030 assets from regional escalation
TUCSON, Arizona: As US President Barack Obama left his country’s embassy in Dublin in his fully armored limousine, his convoy hit an unexpected snag. The vehicle’s underside scraped on a simple ramp and became stuck at the gate — a multimillion dollar machine defeated by an ordinary piece of pavement. The image is hard to forget — enormous investment, but poor design for real world conditions. Our region risks making the same mistake if we pour money into “exquisite” defenses that fail at the critical moment.
The US Defense Innovation Unit, created in 2015 by then Defense Secretary Ash Carter, was meant to prevent exactly that kind of failure in the military domain. It was designed to break through Pentagon bureaucracy and connect the armed forces with fast-moving technologies from Silicon Valley, shifting from slow, traditional contractors to agile private firms. In reality, this has meant experimenting with autonomous systems, microsatellites, and artificial intelligence, while fighting the inertia, over-centralization, and rent-seeking that often plague big defense programs. The core lesson is simple: if you do not reform how you buy and use technology, you end up with very expensive systems that are not fit for the next war.
