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Originally Posted by mikhail  technolgy has always been pushed towards military use from civilian and vice versa.since the military is a govenment sector its often up to the private sector. |
As spin-offs become more scarce, we have to consider that the military sector is a drain on the economy. It becomes a standard "crowding out" problem. It steals available R&D resources from the civilian sector without ensuring the levels of technical innovation achieved in the past
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the problem we have in europe is because whenever the governments want to invest in something like space exploration there alot of people who drag up questions like"how many hospital beds could this pay for?"
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The EU, however, is quite aware of its appalling R&D record and the need to try and ape the US's record. It has toyed with using the military sector, but space exploration does look a much more attractive proposition.